Google has funded several efforts
to respond to the enrollment increases without sacrificing diversity gains.
Chris Stephenson has a blog post describing these efforts (https://research.
googleblog.com/2017/02/the-cs-capacity-
program-new-tools-and.html), with links
to more information. Until we can convince schools to increase resources to
departments, developing strategies like
these and sharing them are our best
chances to manage “Generation CS”
without losing ground on our efforts to
provide CS education to all students.

Comments

If the number of female CS graduates
is decreasing, or the number of male CS
graduates is decreasing, you cannot assume
that the only reason is that universities
are not doing enough to recruit them, or
encourage them, into the field.

There are many possible reasons outside
of the purview of computing, and beyond
the competence of the science and practice
of computing. Not all of them are even
addressable by policies in academia.

There is, however, one factor that is not
even mentioned here. There are computing
“boot camps” popping up all over the place in
the U.S. and outside the U.S. These students
are not being counted I’ll bet because this
article only talks about majors and minors
and “diversity” numbers. I personally know
several women who have been through
these. And the cost is a LOT less in both
money and time-to-jobs.

In other words, computing as a practical
skill is gaining ground, and private-sector
computing (and even many government
entities) are interested more in proper results
than in credentials.

Academia has had it pretty good with all
the federally guaranteed loans pouring into
its treasuries after World War II, but the
burden has been put upon the over-taxed
middle class and even worse on college
graduates. Who can blame the victims for
seeking alternatives?

The decline after the peak in 2003mentioned here, we all know why thathappened in the U.S. at least. I’ll bet it wasdifferent in India. Starting with the Y2KI don’t assume that universities are notdoing enough to recruit, encourage, or keepwomen in computing. I know that becausethere is a large body of computing educationresearch showing that it’s true.

I encourage you to look at the excellentbooks about the work at Carnegie MellonUniversity where they successfully haverecruited women so that over 40% of theirCS class is female. Or, check out the articleson Harvey Mudd College where they areover 50% female. There is a project calledBRAID ( https://www.hmc.edu/about-hmc/2014/09/24/harvey-mudd-launches-initiative-increase-diversity-computer-science/) to teach other CS departmentswhat Harvey Mudd figured out. It’s withinthe CS departments’ control to improve theirgender diversity.The research on “boot camps” isdevastating. Many “boot camp” studentstake repeated boot camps because theydon’t learn enough CS and can’t get jobs.

The reason why few women pursue
computing in the U.S. has nothing to do
with biology. At Qatar University, computer
science is 75% female and computer
engineering is 100% female (https://
computinged.wordpress.com/2010/10/18/
latest-enrollment-numbers-at-qatar-university-big-gender-imbalance/). The
gender balance in CS is much more about
culture than it is about biology.

I have two daughters myself. Both
have tried computer science classes and
been quite successful in them. Neither
are choosing to get CS degrees. There
is nothing wrong with them for pursuing
other subjects. As a computing education
researcher who studies broadening
participation issues, I can list for you all
the things that their CS departments did
wrong—not recruiting, not encouraging,
not keeping women. The problem is with
the CS departments, and the data and
research studies back me up.